Midnight Storm Update

I just wanted to do a quick storm update and label some of the things going on with this storm.  Here's a quick overview of what we're looking at.  First off, the snow/mix line has now pushed north and west of Richmond and Danville.  Areas like Williamsburg and Virginia Beach have even changed to rain.  I don't think this will advance much farther north and west as the upper level low to our west is beginning to work in and will hult this progress.  The heaviest bands of snow are setup across southwest Virginia in the New River and Roanoke Valleys.  These have been putting down 1-2" per hour snows at times, hence why some of these areas are approaching 1 foot of snow.  I do expect these bands to work further northeast throughout the next few hours to impact areas like Charlottesville, the Shenandoah Valley, and DC.  Next up, you can see a dry slot is working into portions of Georgia and the western Carolinas.  This will slowly work into southwestern VA.  I do expect this to be a slow process, so several hours of moderate to heavy snow is still likely for these areas.  A lot of times with these types of events, you will even see the back edge of this precipitation back-build, keeping the dry slot away for longer than it may appear on radar.  This is especially the case since we still have an upper level low thats spinning over northern Alabama, which leads me to my next point. 

Upper Low shown at 700 mb over northern Alabama/Mississippi

 This is what will be responsible for our deformation band.  Short range models continue to show this band pivoting through the morning hours across western VA during the early part of the day Thursday and to the I95 corridor tomorrow afternoon and evening.  

deformation band depicted by hrrr 

This will once again bring in colder air at the upper levels and change many of the areas that saw mix/rain back over to snow.  This band still has potential to put down a quick couple inches for some areas...in other words, it will be bonus snow.  There may be a lull between the main precipitation shield moving out and the deformation band swinging through, so don't let your guard down.

Here's a look back at my final call I issued Tuesday night.  I never redo my final calls, but as I noted on the facebook page earlier: Due to the heavy snow bands that continue to stream into most of central and western VA, there will be some areas in my 8-12" band that see higher amounts. I'm talking areas especially along I-81 like Wytheville to Lexington to Harrisonburg. I still think areas right along the Blue Ridge will be the Jack Pot Zone with widespread 12"-16" with locally up to 20".